ns of education and of study, clothing and
support are furnished by society; no pupil is at a disadvantage with
another.[216] That is another chapter at which our "men of law and
order" bristle up indignantly.[217] "The school-house is to be turned
into barracks; parents are to be deprived of all influence upon their
children!" is the cry of our adversaries. All false! Seeing that in the
future society parents will have infinitely more time at their disposal
than is the case to-day with the large majority--we need but to call
attention to the ten to fifteen hour day of many workingmen in the post
office, the railroads, the prisons, the police department, and to the
demands made upon the time of the industrial workers, the small farmers,
merchants, soldiers, many physicians, etc.--it follows that they will be
able to devote themselves to their children in a measure that is
impossible to-day. _Moreover, the parents themselves have the regulation
of education in their hands; it is they who determine the measures that
shall be adopted and introduced. We are then living in a thoroughgoing
democratic society. The Boards of Education, which will exist, of
course, are made up of the parents themselves--men and women--and of
those following the educational profession._ Does any one imagine they
will act against their own interests? That happens only to-day when the
State seeks but to enforce its own exclusive interests.

Our opponents furthermore demean themselves as though to-day one of the
greatest pleasures of parents was to have their children about them all
day long, and to educate them. It is just the reverse in reality. What
hardships and cares are to-day caused by the education of a child, even
when a family has but one of them, those parents are best able to judge
who are themselves so situated. Several children, in a manner,
facilitate education, but then again they give rise to so much more
trouble that their father and especially the mother, who is the one to
bear the heaviest burden, is happy when the school hour arrives, and
thus the house is rid of the children for a portion of the day. Most
parents can afford but a very imperfect education to their children.
The large majority of fathers and mothers lack time; the former have
their business, the latter their household to attend to, and their time
is furthermore taken up with social duties. Even when they actually have
time, in innumerable instances they lack the a